Shrewsbury Town

Marcus Braddock takes his usual look back and forward at all things Town

This weekend I watched Shrewsbury Town win 1-0 and thoroughly enjoyed it. I have vast respect for the people who travelled all the way to Devon for 90 minutes of football but I don't have that level of commitment so instead I watched the our Under-18 team. I used to watch the youth players quite often when Conor Goldson and Ryan Woods were playing so it was interested to see our latest batch of future prospects in action.

Christos Shelis is one who has been in our minds recently and you can see why the club have signed him up to a professional contract. I tend to think that the captain should be identifiable from how he plays and this is the case with Christos. Obviously a strong player physically, Shelis communicates very well with his team-mates and plays very much by example.

The two lads up front, Lifumpa Mwandwe and Tyrone Ofori caused plenty of problems for the Fleetwood defence, their pace and movement was good enough to stretch the opposition and they both seem to position themselves well in relation to each-other and the rest of the team. As with the first team this season, I can’t remember a player that didn't put in a shift in and it looked to me like we had the better of both halves. Midfielders Ryan Barnett and Reiss Corfield combined well in the first half for the goal with Barnett making space for himself to cross from the right for Corfield to head it well beyond the reach of the Fleetwood keeper.

The men's first team earned themselves a valuable point at Plymouth against a team that set itself up to frustrate us and succeeded in part. Given the season we've had it almost feels disappointing to come away with a draw but it's another point and yet another unbeaten game. I see it as a huge banana skin avoided and if you're superstitious you'll be glad to get game 13 out of the way unscathed.  Regardless of where we end up at the end of the season, this team has gone over a quarter of it in League One without losing. I can’t think of one genuine disappointment from this team in all of that time and I find myself going to games feeling excited rather than apprehensive.

This week I've left the best until last and that is the Shrewsbury Town Ladies who won their game against Florence Sports 8-0! Having already seen the youth team the previous day I toyed with the idea of popping to London Road to watch this one and I'm kicking myself now! In a game where they were described as “dominant” Millie Young scored a hat-trick and earned herself player of the match in the process.